Robinhood is taking one of crypto’s most popular trading instruments and applying it to the world of stocks, gold, and forex. The company announced on June 30 that it’s launching perpetual futures in the European Union, starting with crypto assets and gradually expanding into commodities, ETFs, and currencies.
Perpetual futures are derivatives contracts that let traders bet on price movements without ever taking delivery of the underlying asset, and crucially, without an expiration date. They’ve been a staple of crypto exchanges for years. Robinhood is now bringing that mechanic to traditional finance territory.
How the product works
At launch, eligible EU customers can trade crypto perpetual futures with up to 3x leverage. That number could eventually climb as high as 10x, which would put Robinhood’s offering in competitive range with dedicated crypto derivatives platforms.
All trades are routed through Bitstamp’s exchange infrastructure. That’s the same Bitstamp that Robinhood acquired for $200M, a deal that gave the company a licensed, established foothold in European crypto markets without having to build everything from scratch.
